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Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Clear your mind and then thoughtfully consider your elementary school years. What do you remember? Were you the playground bully? Were you the leader of your group? Were you picked last for kickball teams? Were you on the hallway patrol? Were you a red bird or blue bird?

What were your feelings as you walked into the building each day? Was it a safe place for you or did you fear it? Did you feel loved by the adults in the building or did you feel like no one cared? Did you have a favorite part of the building?

How would you feel if you returned to your elementary school building today and was able to explore?

I attended Eastern Elementary School from first grade through seventh grade in a small hamlet called Red Oak, Georgia. Basically Red Oak is a post office stop between College Park and Fairburn. During the Civil War, Red Oak was where Union soldiers incapacitated the railroad and then separated into two columns as they marched towards Jonesboro. There used to be several buildings in the area that hinted at Red Oak’s past. The Sewell Hat Factory was an abandoned piece of property I passed each day on my way to school. It was one of just many pieces of property including plantations that the Sewell family owned in the area.

Red Oak was nice little community when I was young but began to slowly decline in the early 1980’s. During the late 80’s and 90’s Red Oak was a fairly dangerous place. A housing project had been built at the end of Campbell Drive, the street where my school is at. There were news stories all the time about people getting robbed and shot. The housing project finally shut down and later was torn down.

Currently Red Oak is on the verge of a comeback. I did a quick tax parcel check the other day (my legal background comes in handy) and I was surprised that I recognized a fairly high number of old Red Oak names. It appears many folks have held onto to their properties and it looks like they may have been actually smarter than all those folks who moved away.

I had looked for my old home all morning and had visited the old Campbell County Courthouse (see part two of my scavenger hunt here). My last stop of the day was a visit to my old school. It is amazing how you can drive up to a location where you spent a large amount of time as a child and as you motor down the road suddenly your memories take over because it all seems so familiar. It’s like your body goes on auto-pilot. As I turned down Campbell Road and passed by familiar homes I mentally stated each family’s name as I passed the homes they had long since moved out of. I felt the same familiar lurch in my body as I turned into the drive of the school that was flanked by the same old pine trees that used to greet me each morning.

The cornerstone of Eastern Elementary states it was built in 1941. It is a lovely old building that was added onto in the 1960s. The front canopy along the walkway and the front shrubbery was added in the 1970s. The outside looks exactly the same. I parked my car at the flag pole where I sat to have my sack lunch during our fifth grade picnic.

For the last several years the building has been used as a public safety training facility but as I approached the front door a sign told me things had changed. The hallway confirmed for me that I wouldn’t find policemen in the building anymore because the hallway was filled with voting machines. The same lovely hardwood floors greeted me and said a creaky hello as I walked down the hallway. Realizing there might be valid reasons why they wouldn’t want someone from off the street wondering around I quickly found the man in charge and told him why I was at his office door. Gerry M. welcomed me like an old friend. He was great…..in fact he walked around with me and I gave him the grand tour of his workplace.

They’ve placed carpet over the old hardwood floors but in my day they were simply lovely in the hallway and in the classrooms. The custodians would buff them to a high sheen. We would haggle with our teachers to get permission to work on a project in the hall. In no time our shoes would be off and we would test the slide factor of the floors.

This is a picture of Mrs. Posey’s classroom where I was for fifth grade.

Looking at the room from the perspective of a teacher it was fairly large. Notice the chalkboard and rack. They are built into the wall. Mrs. Posey always looked like a million bucks each day of the year. She had cute Jackie O. dresses with matching coats which were very stylish in the late 60s and early 70s for women her age. She wore high heels and stockings every day----she never wore pants. Her nails and red hair were always done. I used to watch her count the lunch money each day. “Click, click, click went her nails as she picked up the coins. I was mesmerized as she placed the money in the striped draw-string bags the office provided for the lunch count. When she was finished she would look up and sometimes we made eye contact. She would smile and then motion for me to come and get the bag so I could take it to the office. It was a great responsibility.

The cafeteria had been partitioned off for some reason but since the hallway doors were still in the same place we could piece together the route students took as they came in to get their trays and where they sat. I walked to the exit door to the wall where we would line up to leave. The first spot next to the door was the most desirable. The person who claimed this spot would be the line leader. Many times the “leader” would be directed to the back of the line due to the methods they had employed to claim first-in-line-status.

This is a picture of the auditorium. Up front is the stage where I made my debut as the narrator in the annual Christmas play.

During 7th grade, the first year we changed classes, our teachers would use the auditorium to show movies. These weren’t videos, but honest to goodness reel-to-reel films, usually a National Geographic title. I told Gerry all about how the pictures used to bounce sometimes, the whirring sound of the projector, and the inevitable flap, flap, flap as the film finally wound all the way through the machine.

The L-shaped library shelves, shown above, for the older grades were still in the same spot. I pointed out the locations where I would find Across Five Aprils, Homer Price, and the Beverly Cleary and Carolyn Haywood (B Is for Betsey) books. There were about six tables set up in two columns for kids to sit and read in the middle where you see all of the voting machines.

This is the classroom where I had Mrs. Olvey (third grade) and Mrs. Frye (fourth grade). Mrs. Olvey was close to retirement age when I had her. She always wore red lipstick. We had to write the pronunciations of each spelling word every week. I would sit by those windows and daydream instead of completing my work. Mrs. Frye was younger and more mysterious. She had been a nun….I had never known a Catholic before. I always wondered why she had decided not to be a nun anymore. We did a project in her room regarding birds. We even had to create and sew birds out of fabric. She made us do it at school and on our own. It was hard. My owl is at my Dad’s house somewhere.

Look at the great wall of windows. The view is exactly the same as I remember it.

I snapped a shot of the other side of the room too. I managed to get a picture of Gerry, my tour participant. It was simply a great classroom. They don’t design them like this anymore.

I enjoyed walking through my past today. I reconnected to memories that I need in my toolbox as a teacher. I want to hold fast to some of the emotions I felt as I entered the school office and saw the same counter where the secretary sat or entered the principal’s office. I need to remember the feelings of accomplishment as I mastered some bit of hard content. I also need to hold onto the frustration I felt when I was made to write the pronunciation of my spelling words. I need to hold fast to the notion that my students have many of the same emotions that I once had.

How will my students feel about their experiences with me thirty years from now? Am I doing all that I can to provide good memories?

What say you? :)

I want to thank Gerry M. and his staff for being so nice to me as I went on my grand tour. County employees get a bad rap sometimes. I know because I’m a county employee.

Tomorrow I will visit my old home site to see if I can pick up any clues to the whereabouts of my childhood home. Join me as I continue scavenging for my past!

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17 comments:

Boy does that make me think about my elementary and middle school days. Luckily I still live where I grew up, but a piece of me dies everytime they replace one of my schools with a "new" one.Thanks for sharing and renewing the memories...

I don't normally delete comments from this blog, but Stillwater's comment had nothing to do with the post. and it was a most obvious trick to get people to follow his links to another site for a sales pitch. Stillwater needs to follow another method to advertise his/her business.

Wow! What a small world we now live in with our technology. I also attended Eastern Elementary School-1st through 7th grade. (1965-1972) I also had Mrs. Posey for 5th grade. My sister had Mrs. Olvey for 3rd. We lived on Old Fairburn Rd. which was right off Buffington Rd. across from where the Auto Auction is. I have wanted to go back and walk those halls but have never made the effort. Maybe I will now. I certainly enjoyed the pictures.

I went to Eastern Elementary also. 3rd thru 7th grade and left in 1975. I have wonderful memories too. I remember Mrs. Bowman I had in 7th grade, and Mrs. Connor was the Librian. Playing kickball and having softball practice on the big field. Oh yeah, and the 600 yard dash where I got the Presidential Fitness Award! What a wonderful place to grow up!

Hi! Just got word that they will be tearing down Eastern Elementary soon. This doesn't surprise me as I'm sure it is not an energy efficient building, but it takes a piece of me with it --- the 5th and 6th grade pieces --- and memories of walking to school (only time I was able to do that), my 6th grade teacher's iced coffee (she was WAAYYY ahead if her time, Starbucks!), kickball games, library class photos, creaky hallways, transom windows and friends I hold dear some 40 years later. :)

Friend of Claire Lanes Santuae here--she posted this on FB. Beautiful header, clever blog concept. Interestingly, my home town of Greenville, SC, has torn down my elementary school twice since it's 60s construction. Here in Nashville we are still using buildings from the 40s!

I went to Eastern also and had Mrs. Connor for fourth grade in '73, one of my favorite teachers. I'll never forget her reading Huckleberry Finn to us. She self-censored the N word throughout the book but one day she slipped and said it out loud. She actually came to tears as she apologized to the class. I'll never forget that.

I just wanted let you know that the building that housed Eastern Elementary School in College Park burned down today. There's an article in ajc.com about it with photos. Apparently the building had been vacant for about 5 years. A car that that had been set on fire in front of the building started the fire. It was interesting to see your photos of the school. I began my teaching career there back in 1983. I taught 2nd grade there until they closed the school in 1986.

Hello there, I too attended Eastern Elementary until '68 when I moved on to Lakeshore High. Worked there with the Fulton County Public Safety Training Center many years later. Sadly I received a report that it burned to the ground last Thursday. I guess you were lucky to have visited it in its last days, it had fallen into a state of abandonment afterwards. Thanks for the article.

My Daddy pulled up Eastern Elementary on Google Maps today (5/29/13) to show me his old school; it was shockingly sad how the school is 'disrespected' (old tires, garbage, more garbage, etc.). Daddy attended from 1952 to 1959 (1st through 7th). He wanted to take me, but the area is still quite dangerous - even during the weekday hours. (Ironically his parents still live 'across' Roosevelt, just down Buffington. That's the only part of Red Oak we dare visit anymore. It's a real shame

I am leaving this comment to your post about Eastern Elementary in July 2013, many years after your original post. I found it by Googling Eastern Elementary to see if anything would come up.

I attended Eastern Elementary from 1978-81, which must have been some years after you. Mrs. Walthall was principal during my years there.

I believe my third grade class was in the same room as yours, though my teacher was Ms. Beck, who was in her mid-20s (I think). I remember the beautiful view of nature from that window.

Later for 4th grade, I was further down the new hall in Mrs. Lawrence's class, which was on the upper floor of the new hall and was the last classroom on the side facing the playgrounds. My mother began teaching 6th grade at Eastern during my 4th grade year, and she became close friends with Mrs. Lawrence. They remained close friends until my mother passed in 2010. Mrs. Lawrence passed in 2011 at the age of about 84.

I had Mrs. Meadows in 5th grade, and then I transferred to Brookview at the beginning of the 1981-82 school year.

I was too young then to know how truly dangerous the Red Oak projects were, but perhaps they weren't as bad at the time as they would become later in the 1980s. I made friends with many of the kids who lived in Red Oak. My mother rented an apartment in what used to be called Castilian Heights on Washington Rd. During my Eastern years, I used to often walk to school by taking a trail behind Castilian Heights and then Campbell Drive. My mother, of course, drove most days. I think I used to walk b/c she had to be at work earlier than I had to be at school, but also b/c I enjoyed talking with friends during the walk to school. Try to picture the geography. When I emerged from the trail behind Castilian Heights onto Campbell Drive, I would usually encounter students walking from the Red Oak projects.

So, I went from Eastern to Brookview and ultimately to M.D. Collins, from which I graduated high school. Red Oak, East Point, and College Park were different places in those days. Atlanta in general was different. I loved your description of Red Oak in the 70s as a "hamlet." Yes, there was something really quaint about it.

This just made me so homesick for my time at Eastern Elementary...those wonderful waxed and buffed wood floors...and I was so sad when I heard of it burning.I am the sister of Brad Jones, who commented earlier, and a forever friend of Claire Land Santuae, someone mentioned knowing. I was there in the 5th through 7th grades and had Ms. Posey...LOVED her perfection lipstick and liner application...had Mrs Pittman in the 6th grade and Dear dear Mrs. Bowman for 7th grade until mid year when we moved back to Orlando. I will never ever forget, and will always be very grateful, for the impact Mrs. Beasley, the librarian, had on my life. I would love to know what ever happened to her and if anyone knows how I could get in touch with her. I became a 6th grade teacher and after retiring, I have become an author and illustrator of children's books. Thank you so much for this walk down memory lane. We lived in Vermont Estates, and always walked the trail through the woods, to school...Christie Jones Ray

I went to Eastern Elementary from first grade in 1961 through 4th grade in 1965. They didn't have kindergarten back then. Captain Kangaroo was my kindergarten teacher. I have many good memories there but I also have some shocking memories. Does anyone remember the baby beds in the halls? If you got in trouble you were put in a baby bed for all the other kids to see. One time my brother was in the baby bed when my class came in from recess. I was so embarrassed! What a horrible discipline system. I am "retired" from teaching now and I can only imagine what would happen if a school did that today. Wow

I went to Eastern Elementary School from 1st through 4th grades. I too had Mrs. Olvey for third grade. Miss Ivey for first grade and Mrs Allen for 2nd grade. I attended from 1961-1965. I remember playing marbles on the playground . I played with the boys a lot even though I'm a girl. My two older brothers attended Eastern as well. One day while in the lunchroom, I saw teachers going to and from the playground. They left the building with clean white towels and returned with blood soaked towels. My older brother had been hit in the head with a baseball bat (accidentally). He was ok after a few stitches. I also remember my other brother being put in a baby bed for punishment. The baby beds were kept in the hallways so that all the kids in the school could see who got in trouble. I was really embarrassed to see my brother in there. I have to admit, as much as I loved school there was a good bit of fear that followed me in the building each day. Does anyone else remember the baby beds?